


Stop Ahead

by swamplamp



Category: Breaking Bad
Genre: Gen, Jesse heals, Minor Original Character(s), Post-Felina, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, references to past abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2017-07-16
Packaged: 2018-12-02 18:31:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11515026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/swamplamp/pseuds/swamplamp
Summary: He’s parked on the shoulder of a long brown stretch of nothing but road and dirt.





	Stop Ahead

He’s started a list of things he likes.

Item one: the color yellow. He’s been parked for maybe 20 minutes in front of one of those caution signs that tell you there’s a stop ahead. He sits in the driver’s seat of whatever the hell car this is, elbow rested against the groove of the car door. He’s staring.

It’s almost a mustard yellow. He fucking hates mustard, but the color of the sign is nice. He sits in his seat, absorbing the sight of the sign. He wants to sit down in that color and just be.

He’s parked on the shoulder of a long brown stretch of nothing but road and dirt. He mostly stopped because he’s getting paranoid about how much gas he has left. The little orange light by the fuel gauge has been telling him that he’s low on gas. But they never really tell you how much gas is left.

So he’s kind of screwed. At the same time, he doesn’t really care. He has this piece of shit White Supremacist car and the Stop Ahead sign to keep him company. And now that the sun’s up, it’s getting warmer. It’s early enough in the morning that nobody’s around but bright enough to feel like day. Unless it's just as empty anytime of the day. Where the hell is he?

Actually, it doesn't matter.

Right now, it reminds him of Saturdays. Saturdays, he likes. The morning and the way that the sun full-on thaws him out through the windshield feels like pancake breakfast. He remembers Saturdays as a dumb little kid stacking two of the best-looking pancakes on top of each other and sticking a slice of butter between the two so the butter would melt just right. He never touched the rounder pancakes. He'd dig around the pile to find the oval ones with the wort-y bubbles sticking out of them. Those tasted the best, especially after they took a swim down the syrup moat. He would drizzle a ravine across his plate and let his pancake boat sail down.

He wakes to the sound of knocking on the window. The air in the car has turned thick and hot. He rolls the window down and a cool breeze lets itself into the stuffy space.

"You okay there?" the man asks. He has dark long hair in a braid. Jesse remembers that his hair has gotten long too. He hates the way it feels on his neck and face, but what he hates even more is the idea of going to someone to get it cut.

"I'm--" He swallows. His voice is hoarse. “I’m out of gas."

"Are you headed to Santa Fe?" The man has this deeply concerned look in his eyes. It makes Jesse's palms itch. "I can take you there, find you a phone?"

Suddenly, Jesse worries for the man's life. He shouldn't offer help like that. He could get hurt by just about anyone, especially if they're sleeping in a stolen car parked on the roadside. 

But he accepts the man's offer because he's so tired. The back of his thighs complain from all the sitting and driving. And the joints in his legs and hips aren't what they used to be; they used to kick him in the legs and try to trip him up whenever he walked by until Jack told them that he needed his legs to cook. 

"How far out are we?" Jesse asks when he gets into the man's truck. It smells like something sweet and warm--the kind of scent you'd smell in someone else's home. Maybe even an air freshener? He rolls down the window.

"I'd say another 35 miles or so. You were almost there."

The ride is a comfortable quiet, something Jesse is thankful for. His shoulders throb at the thought that he's about to be thrown into a city full of people. He's done with people, he thinks. Maybe he'll adopt a dog and live in the woods. 

Except, he doesn't camp. And he doesn't even have money to feed himself. He can't feed a dog.

He can't stay in Santa Fe. He can't get a job. He's just fucked. 

The man breaks the silence first: "If you don't mind me asking, where were you driving from?"

Jesse listens for any sign of suspicion in the man's voice. He only hears curiosity, but maybe that's from hearing Todd's dumb voice for so long. He's deaf from all that white noise. "Albuquerque," he answers, but seriously has no idea.

"Headed to Santa Fe for business or pleasure?"

He thinks on that one for a bit, licks at the nasty acidic taste on his lips. "Business."

"Are you hungry?"

Of course the questions were leading up to something. He can feel anxiety screeching at the pit of his stomach. "Hey, uh, listen: I don't have any money. I should've told you that before I--"

"Oh, no. That's not what I meant. My wife and I live right off the road before we get into the city. We'd love to have you for lunch."

"Please tell me that wasn't a cannibal joke," he says, tired.

The man laughs. "You look like you could use a good meal is all. The name's Ernesto."

"Richard," he chooses. Because he feels like a dick. 

Ernesto's home is exactly how Jesse expected it to be. Suburban neighborhood on the border of dirt fields. The homes are spaced out, not cramped like the neighborhoods he always lived in. But the insides are familiar with glass cases full of antiques and cloth dolls from trips to foreign countries. The sun filters in weakly through curtained windows, leaving the house a little dim. Jesse is overwhelmed with an underwater kind of feeling, like none of this is real. 

When Ernesto shuts the door, Jesse is jarred by the scent of something that speaks to his insides. It smells like cooked meat and fresh lime. His stomach gives a croak and Jesse, startled, puts a hand to his stomach. 

The man just smiles appreciatively and herds Jesse closer to the smells. "Yuliana makes the best posole you'll ever have. Take a seat."

He doesn't totally know what he's eating, but Jesse likes it. He likes the limes. He chewed at the flesh of the lime slices and felt his mouth screaming at the sourness. Sour stuff is the shit. He doesn't like lettuce though, especially when it's in soup. 

He also doesn't like tearing up over a hot bowl of soup full of shredded meat and tiny white things that look like jacked-up baby fists. He slouched in his seat to keep from sobbing in front of these nice people. The meal was good. He couldn't remember the last time he had a hot meal. Then again, it could've been just a week ago. His sense of time went to shit a while back.

The red broth warmed him up, made him feel weirdly whole. Made him feel hungrier, as if he was missing some of his organs and they're starting to grow back. Ernesto and Yuliana were too polite to acknowledge Jesse sniffling at the dining table. They made him feel like they were okay with him being there. For a few minutes at a time, he felt comfortable. 

So now, he's sitting on the edge of a bed in their guest room. The soup must've lulled him into some kind of submissive state. He has no idea how their conversation led to him agreeing to stay. But here he is, thinking about a shower. 

He needs new clothes. He's sick and tired of wearing Todd's old shit. If he has to feel the leg of his jeans drag across the floor under the heel of his shoe again, he's going to jump out a window. He thinks of options and they're pretty slim. 

"What day is it?" Jesse asks out in the hall, trying to keep his martian questions at a minimum. But he figures knowing what day of the week it is might help him figure things out.

"Saturday," Ernesto answers. "That's why I'm not at work. Speaking of work, there might be some kids coming by later in the afternoon. Yuliana watches over some of the neighbor kids. I hope you don't mind."

"No," he responds, really wanting him to know that it's okay and that he doesn't need to worry about any risk of those kids going missing or Jesse flipping out. He searches for words of reassurance. "I used to have a little brother. Kids are cool."

Ernesto pats him lightly on the back like he knows what he means. Jesse can't really figure out if this guy is an all-knowing Jesus figure or stupidly trusting of everything. 

Several car doors slam out front. Jesse feels it in his spine like the recoil of a fired shot. He amps himself up for company.

He wasn't joking when he said that some kids would be coming by. There are four of them. Five, if you include the baby. Ernesto made himself scarce before the kids came in, making Jesse wonder if that's the smart thing to do because these children are screaming before they make it through the doorway. 

They're all tiny and high-pitched. Yuliana put Jesse to work with the dishes and he happily took over for her as she managed these kids. She turns the TV on and sets up a bunch of toys and games for them. 

In record time, he's approached by a kid. A boy with big brown eyes and his front teeth have been replaced by four little metal stubs. He's got his fingers in his mouth when he asks Jesse, "Do you live here?"

"For a little bit, yeah."

"Where's--" he starts but wobbles around where he stands. "What happened to Jonathan?"

He sets aside the sponge and plate in his hands to turn to the boy. "I don't know. He's not here today."

The boy drops his shoulders and makes an exaggerated groan, as if Jonathan not being here is really testing his shit. Then he's over it. "Can you color?"

"With you?" For a second, he thinks about saying no. But he's pretty sure there's this universal rule against shooting down a little kid when he asks you to color with him. "Sure."

They sit at the dining table with a bunch of crayons laid out and some sheets of scratch paper. Jesse doesn't really know what to draw and finds himself taking the kid's lead. 

"Can I draw sharks?" the kid asks him like he needs Jesse's permission.

"Yeah, man. Let's draw sharks."

Jesse makes sure that the kid doesn't draw all over the wooden tabletop and feels like a responsible adult when the kid sticks to drawing on the paper. Jesse draws his shark with big, sharp teeth and laser beams coming out of its eyes.

"I'm done," the kid says. Jesse looks over to see that his shark is a tiny, star-shaped thing at the bottom of the page.

"That must be one of those snowstorm sharks. Look at all that white around it."

"No, it's in the sky. I'll draw it blue." He picks up the light blue crayon and starts coloring in the whole page with wide strokes. Jesse's concern about the tabletop is renewed. "Can I draw my sister?"

"Yeah, you can. Is your sister one of these kids?" Jesse asks, gesturing to the two girls singing and dancing to something glittery on the TV. 

"She's the little one. With Yuliana."

He means the baby, Jesse guesses. Yuliana is feeding a bottle of milk or formula or whatever to her on the couch, while a chubby little boy with a pacifier in his mouth stumbles around Yuliana's legs. This is kind of a madhouse. It's a lot of kids at once, but Yuliana seems really chill about this whole situation.

"Are all these kids your brothers and sisters?"

"No," the boy laughs around the fingers in his mouth like that's completely ridiculous. 

“You got a name, little bro?"

"Francisco." 

Jesse waits for a beat to pass. And he's relieved to watch Francisco continue coloring without asking for Jesse's name in return. He doesn't need to lie to this kid.

\---

He doesn't like the feel of money in his hands. It's nothing but greasy-ass paper, and people have lost their shit over it for a long time. 

"It's for helping Yuliana babysit," Ernesto explains.

"Yo, letting me stay here is payment enough. You really shouldn't."

Ernesto waves his hand and that's that. It's 12 bucks and it's way more than Jesse wants. But 12 dollars is enough to get him some new clothes, so it's enough of a promise for some kind of freedom. In the shower, he has scratched and scrubbed away at the dirt he could and couldn't see, but it hadn't really mattered. Once he put his only set of clothes on, he stunk like he did before.

So he walks to a weed-infested shopping center that he saw the day before. He doesn't want to say he limped there, but he can say for sure that walking isn't the most comfortable thing to do these days. His hips creak. He's gotten so used to walking with shackles weighing down his ankles and bringing him to a dumbass waddle. 

He wants to get in and get out. He keeps his head down, feeling like a crook. The thrift store smells like recycled feet and there are one too many cowboy hats on too many heads around here. But when he squeezes into a fitting room and slips on jeans that are his size, it's good. It's so good. 

He sweats at the checkout counter, hoping the amount doesn't go over 12 dollars. There's an Everest-sized pile of clothes behind the cashier and thinks about what he can bear to see get thrown in that pile. 

"Eleven ninety-eight," the cashier says.

Jesse walks back home with a lightly stained pair of jeans, a shirt with long sleeves, some boxers, and two cents. He scratches his chin at a crosswalk and realizes he should've got himself a razor. 

Whatever.

The walk back feels shorter. He retraces his steps and wonders if that's a bad idea. He could leave. He could run again.

"Richard," Ernesto greets him at the door. It looks like they're getting ready to go out, coats on and keys in hand. "We're headed to church. Would you like to join us?"

"Uh, nah." Hard pass on that one, really. "I've gotta clean up."

"Food's in the fridge if you're hungry."

Ernesto and Yuliana don't owe Jesse anything and Jesse hopes they realize that. This situation reeks of his old family. His mom, his dad, and Jake. They go to church while Jesse kicks it wherever he wants. He knows how it goes.

He’s ready for those new clothes.

\---

Ernesto returns and appears at the doorway of Jesse's room after two o'clock with a pocket Bible in hand. Leather-bound with gold around the outer edges of each page. Jesse's seen ones like those before, lined along the backs of pews at the church his parents used to drag him to on religious holidays. He remembers Easter Sundays with this spastic white kid and his family who invited him in every year to play bible study games with him. It was stupid. They stopped inviting him over after Jake was born. That was also--purely by chance--after the year Jesse decided to throw some bigass fake eggs up into the air. Coincidentally, they landed on Spencer's little sister's head and she cried for the rest of the afternoon. Fuck Easter, to be honest.

"Richard--"

"What?" Jesse looks up. He forgot that Ernesto was standing in front of him.

Ernesto leans against the doorframe to regard him closely. Jesse blinks, sloughing away that spacey haze. He works up the appetite for inevitable conversation and is struck with the worry that he's about to be read scripture verses. He keeps his eyes to the floor and waits the silence out.

"Would you tell me about your family?"

"Um, sure." Yeah, Jesse knows he's about to roll into rough territory. "I, uh-- I had a mom and dad. Little brother. They were cool, I guess."

This only draws him in more. "Are they still around?"

"Not around me. You know how it goes." Jesse looks up at Ernesto, hoping it'd be enough of an answer. It isn't. "They're still in Albuquerque. I mean, I hope they are."

"You should call them."

"Wait, why?"

"I can tell just by knowing you that you come from good stock. They're worried about you."

Jesse can feel his mouth forming harsh words. He tampers it down before anything comes out. He deflates, feeling the hot air seep out of him. He's not gonna call them.

"You're going to call them," Ernesto states. He pushes himself off the door frame and starts to walk off because that's final.

Jesse doesn't let it be final. This guy doesn't know jack shit about him. His blood boils when he asks, "Whose room did this used to be?"

"My son's."

"Is his name Jonathan?"

He nods. "He's gone. Francisco's been asking after him for months now. Still thinks someone's gonna give him answers."

"You don't know where he is?"

Ernesto lets a few seconds pass. He's kind of dramatic. His eyes meet Jesse's and says, "You know how it goes."

Dramatic fucker.

\---

When Jesse was a kid, he had lots of energy. He'd always be skidding across the smooth classroom floor on his knees like a rockstar and his teachers gave him hell for it. He didn't care. Whenever he got chewed out by anyone, he put his mind somewhere else, always on the move.

He kind of forgot what it was like to be Francisco's age. Six years old. Barely starting school.

Francisco is half-sitting half-standing at the dining room table, Jesse looking over as the little guy writes "from," "for," and "of" on top of the lines that show that he needs to complete the sentences. The blanks for answers have all been filled in with "fram," which Jesse is pretty sure isn't right. 

"Mad props for stamina," he says to Francisco. "You keep trying and that's what's gonna matter once you get to high school."

"Did you go to high school?"

"Yeah, and you're already smarter than when I was in high school."

Francisco grins widely but narrows his eyes and cocks his head to the side, as if he smells bullshit on Jesse already. That's probably his way of humoring him. Jesse is slightly unnerved by the familiarity of that expression. He's seen it on Ernesto's face a few times, like he could see right through Jesse's lies. 

This kid is nothing like how Jesse was back then. Francisco is quick to pick up on things. He keeps it real and Jesse appreciates that. 

He feels a hand on his shoulder and bites his lip to keep himself from jumping in his seat. He looks over his shoulder. It's just Ernesto with a smile and a plate of scrambled eggs. "Helping Francisco with his homework?"

"Yeah," Jesse breathes. "He knows his stuff."

He sets the plate down in front of Jesse. "This is for you. We figured you were hungry."

Jesse looks up at Ernesto and looks him the eye. He waits for the "and" or "but." It doesn't come. In the end, he feels sincere when he says, "Thank you."

Ernesto looks over to Francisco and asks him something in Spanish. Jesse is half-surprised when Francisco answers back fully in the same language. Ernesto says something else, which causes Francisco to nod excitedly at some idea and hop off the chair to join the other kids.

"Go ahead and eat," Ernesto says to Jesse. "You're good with him, you know."

"He's great." 

"I know you."

"Yeah?" Jesse responds, trying like shit to look casual.

"I don't know if your name really is Richard but I know you're running from trouble. I know that look."

shitshitshit

"You're safe here. Just know that we won't bother you, under the condition that the kids are safe." Ernesto's got a firm look on his face and Jesse does what he can to hold eye contact. "As far as I know, you're family now."

Jesse is no stranger to being dragged into being someone for somebody. He's been "family" to a lot of people, nearly all of them long gone. He stares Ernesto down now, wary. He asks with a lowered voice, "Is something about to go down?"

"I trust you here, Richard. That's all there is to it."

\---

A therapist would tell him he's traumatized because of "what he's been through." But Jesse knows for a fact that that's 100 percent bullshit. He knows he's fine because a) he doesn't feel all that different from before and b) he's not a bitch. He bets that not even Ernesto could guess that just three months ago, he was rationing rusty water from a styrofoam bowl, taking chomping sips out of it like a zebra at the watering hole. He feels healthy. 

So he doesn't know why he starts sweating grossly. He's just wiping down the dining room table for when Yuliana sets the table later in the evening. His lungs, like, shrink or something all of a sudden. He hates it when he sweats and can feel the itch under his shirt like it's needling away at his skin. He feels cold. If he's so cold, then why is he sweating? His digs his nails into the sides of the wooden table and tries to get a fucking grip on himself.

He hobbles to the bathroom, because maybe he just ate something bad. He dry-heaves into the toilet--once, twice, then a half. He just wants to lie down on the floor. That's what he does. He crawls to the living room and finds a nice patch of carpet to lie down on. In the back of his stupid mind, he thinks, Maybe I'm pregnant.

Vaguely amused, he huffs into the scratchy, mauve-colored carpet. A familiar feeling worms its way into his senses, kind of like the warmth that comes along with peeing yourself. He wiggles his feet a little to reassure himself that he hasn't. He's fine. He closes his eyes.

He wakes up to the sound of a knock at the door. Dimly, he decides that if he waits long enough, the person at the door will scram. He's busy. 

The knocking starts to sound persistent, a glint of personality hanging off the beat of thonk-thonk-thonk-thonk. Thinking about something other than his current state pulls him into a stand. His entire body feels light like there are big-ass Swiss cheese holes from head to toe. With a supporting grip on the door frame, he twists the top lock and turns the doorknob to reveal--Francisco.

Jesse feels himself straighten up. "What are you doing here, little man?"

Francisco strolls into the house like he owns the place. He clearly came on his own. “I’m the only one here?"

“Uh, yeah. You and me,” he responds, already knowing that this is not a situation he should be in. "Are you supposed to be here?"

“My mom told me to come here. She went to pick up my brother in the Lunas.”

“In _Las Lunas_?” Jesse doesn’t know shit about geography but he knows Las Lunas is far from here. Francisco nods vacantly to confirm, his back to Jesse because he's gone off to play with something near the TV.

Shit. Christ. His shoulders seize up and he bites the inside of his cheek. He wonders if he should call someone? He could go to the neighbors. He doesn't know the neighbors. He doesn't know Ernesto's phone number. Where did they go again? Jesse opens his mouth to ask Francisco something, but decides against it. He stands down and takes in a breath. If he panics, Francisco will panic. 

From the floor in front of the couch, Francisco looks up at Jesse like he's asking him a question, but without words. Jesse realizes that's his cue to smile. Reassure. Smile. The muscles around his mouth twitch and twitch upwards. He smiles weakly. But it's enough. It's enough. Francisco puts a DVD in the video player and settles in. Jesse makes Francisco a sandwich--turkey lunchmeat, lettuce, ketchup, the works. They can get through this.

In two hours, Ernesto and Yuliana come home and they greet Jesse and Francisco like it's nothing. Nothing happened. They got through a moment. No drama, no death. Days can be like this sometimes.

\---

On a sunny yellow morning, he's disoriented when he rouses himself from sleep. Jesse is lying on his side with his cheek to a soft, clean pillow. The window behind him lets in light tinted hues of yellow and orange by a thin curtain, and through the window are reedy branches and a brick wall. For the first time in a while, he feels safe.

He hears someone ask in the back of his mind with a taunting jeer: For how long?

And to that, Jesse says, _Fuck off_.


End file.
